I am going to have to pay more attention to detail if I am going to get through school. Of course, it is only the day before class that I realise one of the essays I've been reading is not required, and at the same time I have completly ignored an essay that is. D-oh! oh well, the one I wasn't supposed to read was pretty good. It's about explanation and description of artworks, and the various implications of different kinds of words and situations. Here's a bit that I thought I'd share, since it applies directly to L.M.'s dog, who is a force of nature, if not a work of art.
In everyday life if I offer a remark like "The dog is big", the intention and effect will depend a great deal on whether or not that dog is present or known to my hearers. If it is not, the 'big' — which, in the context of dogs, has a limited range of meaning — is likely to be primarily a matter of information about the dog; it is big, they learn, rather than small or middle-sized. But if it is present — if it is standing before us [perhahps rubbing it's gi-normous slobbery grinning head in your lap] as I talk—then 'big' is more a matter of my proposing a kind of interest to be found in the dog: it is interestingly big, I am suggesting. I have used 'dog' to point verbally to an object and 'big' to characterize the interest I find in it.
From Michael Baxandall's "Patterns of Intention" in The Art of Art History: A Critical Anthology, Donald Preziosi, ed. (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press), 1998. pp. 59-60
So, would Holy Fucking Shit, the dog is fucking big be considered a tad uneconomic with too many characterizations of interest for academic discourse?
And what about imaginary dogs?
If I say "the dog is big" and I'm referring to my imaginary dog, then what? And what about Clifford the Big Red Dog? Is that dog imaginary or what? I was never sure. He sure is big, though.
And since he's big, red, and good, he may be the perfect piece of contemporary art.
Oh, that was me.
The article didn't cover expletives, although Baxandall did say that descriptive words like "poignant" were too 'soft.'
I figure if your imaginary dog is big that probably means something.
Let's not forget Marmaduke - the big red dog of cartoon evil (evil as in so unfunny that it hurts your brain enought that it almost turns into something cultishly intriguing but not quite).
Marmaduke explained, daily:
http://marmadukeexplained.blogspot.com/
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I am going to have to pay more attention to detail if I am going to get through school. Of course, it is only the day before class that I realise one of the essays I've been reading is not required, and at the same time I have completly ignored an essay that is. D-oh! oh well, the one I wasn't supposed to read was pretty good. It's about explanation and description of artworks, and the various implications of different kinds of words and situations. Here's a bit that I thought I'd share, since it applies directly to L.M.'s dog, who is a force of nature, if not a work of art.
- sally mckay 9-18-2007 5:36 am
So, would Holy Fucking Shit, the dog is fucking big be considered a tad uneconomic with too many characterizations of interest for academic discourse?
- L.M. 9-18-2007 6:25 pm
And what about imaginary dogs?
If I say "the dog is big" and I'm referring to my imaginary dog, then what? And what about Clifford the Big Red Dog? Is that dog imaginary or what? I was never sure. He sure is big, though.
And since he's big, red, and good, he may be the perfect piece of contemporary art.
- anonymous (guest) 9-18-2007 7:34 pm
Oh, that was me.
- rob (guest) 9-18-2007 7:35 pm
The article didn't cover expletives, although Baxandall did say that descriptive words like "poignant" were too 'soft.'
I figure if your imaginary dog is big that probably means something.
Let's not forget Marmaduke - the big red dog of cartoon evil (evil as in so unfunny that it hurts your brain enought that it almost turns into something cultishly intriguing but not quite).
- sally mckay 9-19-2007 12:33 am
Marmaduke explained, daily:
http://marmadukeexplained.blogspot.com/
- rob (guest) 9-19-2007 5:10 am